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That's Moore's shtick though; he's a deconstructor of notions. V for Vendetta was fairly obvious, but then it carried a clearer message of the two and I thought it was Watchmen that came off worse. (Film versions only here)

That's Moore's shtick though; he's a deconstructor of notions. V for Vendetta was fairly obvious, but then it carried a clearer message of the two and I thought it was Watchmen that came off worse. (Film versions only here)

That's how I felt about it too, thought it was awful. The Stephen Fry/Benny Hill moment was just plain embarrassing.

That's Moore's shtick though; he's a deconstructor of notions. V for Vendetta was fairly obvious, but then it carried a clearer message of the two and I thought it was Watchmen that came off worse. (Film versions only here)

Why are you blaming Moore for something he had no hand in?

Personally, since I've all but stopped watching movies in theaters, I'm currently watching The Bridge on the River Kwai on Turner Classic Movies.

NalanoH. Wildmoon
Director of the Friends of Nalano PAC
Attorney at Lawl
"His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy." - Woody Allen

That's how I felt about it too, thought it was awful. The Stephen Fry/Benny Hill moment was just plain embarrassing.

I thought it worked well, but obviously it's quite a divisive film. While not in keeping with all the content, I thought it was the more faithful of the two adaptations. I don't know why, I guess something about Watchmen just left me missing something.

Originally Posted by Nalano

Why are you blaming Moore for something he had no hand in?

I'm not, simply commenting on the fact that of the two films, I personally thought that V was more in keeping with the graphic novel, yet it was the one Moore disowned. Besides, Moore seems quite antagonistic anyhow. I imagine he wouldn't be truly happy with a film version unless it was someone reading out the novel, shown on screen, in real-time.

yet it was the one Moore disowned. Besides, Moore seems quite antagonistic anyhow. I imagine he wouldn't be truly happy with a film version unless it was someone reading out the novel, shown on screen, in real-time.

Moore "disowns" all adaptations*, because he feels they can't be adapted. It's not "we should show someone reading the novel," it's "don't fucking bother."

*You can't disown something you never owned. He never had anything to do with any adaptations.

Last edited by Nalano; 06-05-2012 at 01:48 AM.

NalanoH. Wildmoon
Director of the Friends of Nalano PAC
Attorney at Lawl
"His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy." - Woody Allen

Oh? I thought he was just particularly vocal about V and at least consulted with both. Fair enough then, I stand corrected on that front.

That being said, it's a shame he holds that view in a sense. Obviously graphic novels have greater movement than straight up novels, but there's a vibrancy that film does capture and I think arguably can show you a little bit more. I'm not saying everything should ever be adapted, but especially works like those that Moore have done would surely stand to being the better ones for it considering how layered they are.

Of course, but from that you can derive levels of faithfulness. I'll use Scott Pilgrim as an example as I think it highlights my point well; the graphic novels obviously have a lot more content in them, but they are unquestionably brought to life by film. Colours (completely absent in the novels) and sound makes the world vibrant and alive. It obviously tells a different story, it has to because those 2 hours couldn't compare with the, say, 6-8 or so it took to read, but the concepts, the characters were utterly faithful and near-enough the same story, but in a different manner. I feel the same can be said of V for Vendetta, that it captures the spirit more-than well-enough to convey the same points as in the graphic novel.

If anything, I think trying to stick to the source material too closely results in boredom. You either already know the story or you severely limit the imagination and creativity you provide as your own entertainment while reading. Anyhow, this is going slightly OT and I really should get back to my dissertation! (Once this is all over, perhaps I can find a laughably-bad horror film about lack of sleep to make myself feel better. Go, Pepsi, go!)

I don't think so (but then I would say that!). Like I said, I strongly believe faithfulness is an important aspect. You are not going to be telling the story 1:1. I cannot argue that, it simply isn't possible. So that's a given. What I am saying is that in the different story you tell, you expand on the pre-existing material so that it becomes a differing expansion that is accurate to the universe the original material is in. That, for me, makes a good adaptation. Changing the character, atmosphere, etc. negatively impact and at that point, I think you miss the point of doing an adaptation.

To simply highlight that is reductionist of my argument; I'm talking about faithfulness to the canon, not a 100% conversion. Now, with V for Vendetta, I believe that it feels as part of the universe as the graphic novel it is from. In comparison, I felt Watchmen didn't quite do it justice. I think it was the small things; Night Owl is more of an attractive person in contrast to a significantly older and less...groomed as he is in the novel.

Was it the adaptation or the original? The adaptation's boring as fuck while the other gave me a few jump scares, at least.

But I gotta say, Thai horror movies are much better than the Japanese horrors in my experience

Was that sound suppose to be scary? Horror movies today aim either for shock reaction or shock value, which are most of the time Slashers or Ghost Hunter movies which I both consider not being horror movies.

Saw the Avengers with friends the other day. I think I would have been bored by it had I been watching it alone though but making light of it with friends made it very enjoyable. The movie gets enjoyable when you begin to revel in the ridiculousness on display. The bad acting, corny one-liners you see in comics and humor were pretty fun but what was funnier was Samuel Jackson butting into every scene without actually doing anything except scowl. The scene where he tried to take out a nuke carrying fighter with a bazooka had us in splits.

I think Avengers is a superhero movie done right and is much better than the third Transformers movie which has the same storyline. I guess the reason for this is that The Avengers does not try to pull any pretense over what it really is. You have the director unabashedly use the tropes and conventions of the genre, with a certain panache of course and the tone of the movie remains light throughout rather than one-liners between having lots of people die in every other scene. The large cast is distinctive and doesn't end up being a confused and disjointed mess.

I'm no expert on Moore or his works or even their adaptations, but as I understand it one of the objections purists had to V for Vendetta was that it misrepresented the original text, which was more about contrasting two forms of extremism and painted neither of them in a particularly flattering light, whereas the film, in its rush to incorporate contemporary events and themes, definitely sided with one over the other. This strikes me as a very reasonable basis for objecting to the adaptation, although it has no force for me personally.

Originally Posted by Lilliput King

Don't get how people can take V for Vendetta seriously. It's so absurdly heavy handed and one dimensional I thought it was intended to be a send up.

I don't get how one can miss the basic relationship between non-realistic renderings and their utility in communicating themes in ways which in more realistic contexts would seem heavy-handed, trite, or one-dimensional ... but apparently it is possible.

Originally Posted by sabrage

Zack Snyder is the Baz Luhrman of action movies. That is all.

I am interested to know what you mean by this; I am not terribly well acquainted with Baz Luhrmann (although I have seen Strictly Ballroom and Moulin Rouge!) but Zack Snyder is now quite solidly on my radar following Sucker Punch.